Impact of DaTscan SPECT imaging on clinical management, diagnosis, confidence of diagnosis, quality of life, health resource use and safety in patients with clinically uncertain parkinsonian syndromes: a prospective 1-year follow-up of an open-label controlled study

BackgroundThis study assessed the impact of DaTscan on clinical management, diagnosis, confidence of diagnosis (CoD), quality of life (QoL), health resource use (HRU) and safety during a 1-year follow-up in patients with clinically uncertain parkinsonian syndromes (CUPS).MethodsA total of 19 university hospital centres in Europe and the USA participated in this open-label, single-dose, prospective, clinical trial in patients with CUPS who were randomised to a DaTscan imaging group or to a no-imaging (control) group. The proportion of patients with changes in clinical management, diagnosis, CoD, QoL and HRU from baseline through 1 year post-DaTscan was compared between groups.ResultsThere were 273 patients randomised (135 DaTscan, 138 control). Significantly more patients in the DaTscan imaging group had at least one change in their actual clinical management after 12 weeks (p=0.002) and after 1 year (p